04/21/2022 –
About 14 years ago, my friend Evan had found a program called ATOP (Airline Training Orientation Program). Intended as a weekend experience for those contemplating a career as an airline pilot, it provides a taste of what the training is like, both the classroom work, and the simulator work. Normally, one wouldn’t have access to the advanced full motion simulators that the airlines use for training, but the company purchases unused time blocks from various airlines for use in it’s program. The end result is a very interesting class that is also extremely fun. Unfortunately, I was unable to join Evan when he initially found the program and signed up for the class, but he always spoke fondly of it so when pandemic restrictions began to ease we signed up for a class scheduled for April of 2022.
Early in 2022 the cancer Evan had been battling was getting worse and I lost my friend in March. I was too devastated to consider going to ATOP on my own. My friend Bob encouraged me not to simply drop the class, but it was too late for me push it to a later date. I asked Bob if he would have any interest in going with me. He happily agreed and I began planning a flight to Dallas in the Cozy.
Class was scheduled for the 23rd and 24th of April, so in order to ensure we had time built in for any delays, we set out on the 21st. I first stopped by Bob’s to pick him up and got a bit of help from a nice tailwind that had me seeing over 210Kts GS on the way to Waukesha. After refueling and loading Bob’s gear we set out toward Dallas. There were some isolated areas of small storms so we planned to weave our way as far as we could for the day and tackle the rest the next day. As evening approached we picked Fredericktown, Missouri as our stop for the night. We borrowed the courtesy car and had some AMAZING BBQ at a place just down the road from the airport called “The Pig”.
The next morning we awoke early and started checking weather for the flight down to Dallas. Much like the day before it was mostly small isolated areas to dodge, and probably a good chance we’d get a free airplane wash enroute, but nothing major. Three and half hours later we were landing at Alliance/Fort Worth. We picked up a rental car and set out for lunch (and some shopping as I had forgotten to bring shorts for warmer weather when we weren’t in class).
Saturday was breakfast at the hotel, and a quick meet and greet with our instructor and fellow students, then on to American Airlines Training Center. We spent most of Saturday reviewing systems information on the Boeing 737 which would be our training aircraft. We had lunch at the training center but did dinner out as a class at a local Mexican restaurant. Bob and I had drawn the short straw with a 2am simulator session, so after dinner we quickly went back to the hotel and got some rest so we could be up again at 1am.
PC flight simulation has come a long way in recent years. Microsoft’s Flight Simulator 2020 has such amazing graphics, it is sometimes hard to pick out screenshots from a sim versus real pictures without zooming in closely. Even so, I was not prepared for the level of realism, both from a graphics perspective AND a motion perspective, that is afforded by the full motion simulators the airlines train with. WOW just simply doesn’t do it justice. For those of us who were instrument rated, our instructor gave us the option to attempt an ILS approach down to minimums if we wanted to log an approach. I was all in. I don’t typically fly any of the airliners when I’m practicing with a PC simulator. I prefer to use a sim to practice what is useful for me in my daily flying. A couple of times Evan and I flew in FlightSim over the internet together with an A320, but Evan had to talk me through procedures for it as I knew nothing of how to manage the more complex systems. Hand flying an ILS approach in a 737 was definitely not something I had ever practiced. That said, I actually did a very good job holding course and glide slope. The landing was a little abrupt, due to the fact that I hadn’t pulled all the power out quick enough, but it was certainly acceptable. My instructor tried to tease me a bit that I was taking out runway lights on the right side, as I was a little off the centerline, but it was only by a couple feet on 150 foot wide runway. I might not get hired straight away without further sim practice, but I’m fairly confident no one in the back of the plane would have been complaining, and no overhead bins would have popped open. 🙂
In short, in was a great class. I now wish I had found the time 14 years ago to attend with Evan. A painful reminder that we can’t go back in time. I am very grateful that Bob took time off work to join me in this class. I had a blast and hope to do it again.
Bob and I went back to the hotel, got a couple more hours sleep, then set out for the return trip. We had more rain and clouds to contend with on the return, which would require heading east a fair bit before turning north. We aimed for Hot Springs, Arkansas for lunch and as we were getting closer we noticed the airspeed indication was erratic. As we got closer to Hot Springs, it stopped registering all together. There was either some sort of pitot blockage, or all three ADAHRS sensors filed at the same time, in the same manner. Our money was on blockage. We landed in Hot Springs using GPS ground speed as a reference and set out to investigate the pitot tube. Sure enough dirt combined with water from the rain had turned to mud, which eventually dried after leaving the rain, and created a full on blockage. Confident we had fixed the problem we grabbed some lunch and continued on our way. Four hours later we arrived in Waukesha, grabbed some dinner and more sleep. I would continue the rest of the way home the following day…maybe.
The next morning the weather was not looking terribly great. Instrument conditions I can handle but I know well enough to stay away from convective activity. My return to St. Cloud would wait another day.
